On Monday, eBay announced and demonstrated its new Auctions app at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco. Users can log in to their accounts to buy and sell items wherever they are. The app integrates with Webkit, allowing people to write out full descriptions just like they would in Safari, which has been formatted to match the finger-friendly screen. Users can also browse and sort through auction photos the same way they're used to doing with native albums.

The app will be free with the launch of the App Store, available "early next month."

Update: To help with notifications--like if you get outbid, Apple is providing a centralized notification service. It lets developers push badges, alert sounds (which can be customized), and textual alerts that look like SMS messages. None of these is a background process that runs on your phone, which Apple says will keep battery drain at a minimum.

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Josh Lowensohn joined CNET in 2006 and now covers Apple. Before that, Josh wrote about everything from new Web start-ups, to remote-controlled robots that watch your house. Prior to joining CNET, Josh covered breaking video game news, as well as reviewing game software. His current console favorite is the Xbox 360.
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